What to Cook Now: Trendsetting Ingredients

Soy-Sauce Crystals

Using an 18th-century technique, a Japanese company called Kamebishi makes light, flaky salt crystals by dehydrating soy sauce that’s been fermented for three years in 100-year-old cedar vats. Just a pinch gives shrimp or eggs a meaty flavor. $30 for a 2-oz jar; atthemeadow.com.

The Next Jerk Chicken

If 2008 was the year of jerk chicken, 2009 will be the year of peri peri chicken. Peri peri—also called piri piri—is the Portuguese name for the small, red, fiery bird’s-eye chile grown in much of Africa. Nando’s, a South Africa–based restaurant chain, has just brought its spicy grilled peri peri chicken to the U.S. with its first location in Washington, DC; more American outposts are slated to open later this year. For a taste of peri peri at home, try Nando’s hot sauces. $7 for two 4.7-oz. bottles; nandosusa.com.

Chefs’ Favorite Herb

Its minty licorice flavor has made the flowering herb anise hyssop a new chefs’ darling; its purported health benefits (it may settle an uneasy stomach and help blood flow) are a nice extra. At Seattle’s Corson Building, Matthew Dillon (an F&W Best New Chef 2007) roasts chicken with whole anise hyssop leaves and poaches fruit in an aromatic syrup with the herb’s spiky purple blossoms.

Extreme Eggs

One ostrich egg is the equivalent of two dozen chicken eggs—big enough to make an omelet for 10. Whole Foods locations in the Northeast and parts of Ohio will be selling these prehistoric-looking eggs in the spring (ostriches don’t lay eggs in cold weather) at its “egg bars,” where duck, quail, pheasant and deep-green emu eggs are already available.

Ubiquitous Goat

Whether it’s called cabrito (in Spanish), capretto (in Italian) or katsiki (in Greek), baby goat is showing up on menus everywhere. Chef Michael Psilakis (an F&W Best New Chef 2008) at Anthos in New York City serves it three ways: the roasted rack with goat jus, the poached loin and the braised belly.

Sugar Au Naturel

Cooks are discovering that agave nectar, Indian jaggery and other natural sweeteners have nuanced flavors that white sugar doesn’t; plus, unprocessed sweeteners may be richer in minerals and less likely to cause spikes in blood-sugar levels.